Le nerf de la guerre. Anglophones, please google “nerf de la guerre”. It translates loosely to “the nerve of the war”. It has little do with war or nerves but you’ll not learn that on google. It has the intent of meaning “the essence of…” or the core idea or principle of….

“Le nerf de la guerre” is how one of the scientific directors of the SSHRC HERD team described our submission under the SSHRC funded knowledge synthesis for leveraging public investments in higher education research and development to stimulate innovation. York U’s Knowledge Mobilization Unit and our collaborator Allyson Hewitt (SIG MaRS) were awarded almost $25,000 to undertake a synthesis of the literature and emerging practices that support knowledge mobilization and social innovation. You will see in the concluding slide to my brief presentation (attached below) that the essence of our paper was: collaborate collaborate collaborate.

This was echoed by the Governor General in his opening address to Congress. He said of the Community Campus Collaboration Initiative that “it is simply a superb initiative. It will help us ensure that social innovation is a key component of Canada’s innovation landscape. This initiative also provides us with a catalytic vehicle to apply knowledge and develop experiential learning”.

Collaborate collaborate collaborate. That’s the underlying message of this SSHRC HERD meeting, the Governor General’s Community Campus Collaborations Initiative and much of the dialogue at Congress 2012.

Collaboration seems to be “le neuf de la guerre” for engaged research and knowledge mobilization.

Thanks to Joanne Provencal and Naomi Nichols for their work on this paper